


Reprieve

by ZaliaChimera



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Food, Jack and Eugene on the road, M/M, Pre-Canon, Trans Character, Transgender, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-28
Updated: 2014-02-28
Packaged: 2018-01-14 02:45:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1249852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZaliaChimera/pseuds/ZaliaChimera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack and Eugene stop for the night and finally figure out a few things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reprieve

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Straydog733](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Straydog733).



“Oh thank god,” Jack says when the door to the back of the pharmacy is barricaded as firmly as they can manage with boxes and a set of shelves. They’ve spent the night in worse places, like the one they’d spent huddled in the shadow of a dry stone wall, caught out by a storm. This is practically luxurious in comparison.

God, what he wouldn’t do for an actual bed.

Jack drops his bag and follows after it, leaning back against the wall and stretching his legs out in front of himself. “I ache all over.”

“Yeah,” Eugene says, pacing the room to check the windows. “That last mile was a real killer.”

“Literally in a couple of cases,” Jack says dryly. They’d seen a few corpses of the non-ambulatory kind on the road in, people who must’ve got bitten and then decided to do the right thing, or had their companions make that choice for them.

Eugene glances over at him like he can’t believe that he’s just said that. Jack wouldn’t believe that he’d said it either but it’s either laugh or crack from fear and stress which sounds worse than a little gallows humour. It keeps his mind off stuff anyway, like ugh, another wave of nausea and his stomach clenching unpleasantly. Jack wraps his arms around himself, curling up a little.

At least they’re in the right place. It doesn’t look like it’s been raided too badly.

Eugene’s watching him with some concern when he looks up again. “You okay?”

Jack shrugs. “Hungry, y’know?” he lies. “Apparently a diet made up almost entirely of snack bars just isn’t healthy, no matter what it says on the packet.

“Yeah,” Eugene says with a grimace. “Never thought that cold tinned soup would seem so appetising.”

“Oh god,” Jack moans, closing his eyes. “Soup, with a couple of slices of bread and butter.”

“Don’t,” Eugene says, a note of pleading in his voice.

Jack grins at him, a wicked expression. “Crusty bread, Eugene,” he replies, teasing him mercilessly. It was his duty as a good and loyal friend to exploit any and all weaknesses.

“I hate you so much,” Eugene says but his words are belied by the smile that he can’t hide.

“I know,” Jack says, utterly unrepentant. “Maybe a nice leafy salad with a… raspberry vinigarette.”

“ _Stop_ ,” Eugene says, the word framed with laughter. “I would genuinely kill to eat fresh fruit and vegetables right now.”

“Well, we’ve been killing to eat everything else recently.”

“That is so gross,” Eugene says, giving Jack a fond look that makes Jack’s heart skip and his stomach flutter. That bit would be more pleasant if he didn’t already feel a bit sick. His stomach makes an uncomfortable gurgling noise.

“Gross and hungry. Do you think zombie is edible?”

Eugene grimaces. “Wow. Is this what we’ve come to?” He shakes his head. “I’d better check for supplies before you try it. Maybe there’s some chips or something.”

“Chips?” Jack says, exaggerating his accent. “You’re not in the bally colonies now, good sir!”

“Doofus,” Eugene says. “You check in here. I’ll take the back.”

“Yes mother,” Jack replies, smirking when Eugene rolls his eyes and vanishes. He sighs when Eugene’s gone, rubbing his belly and painfully standing up. Bloody _hell_ , why now? Why couldn’t this have been sorted months ago before the apocalypse?

He mutters uncomplimentary things under his breath as he looks around. It’s one of those villages far enough out to have been mostly missed by looters at the start of the apocalypse, and travelers afterwards which is good for them. Pickings have been getting scarcer the last few weeks.

Painkillers are good to pick up no matter what, and there’s even a couple of packs of the prescription stuff tucked away in a white paper bag at the back of a drawer. Someone’s prescription that never got collected, he supposes. Maybe they can trade it somewhere.

If they ever find somewhere that isn’t overrun.

He swallows a couple of paracetamol down with a gulp of water and keeps poking around until he finally finds what he’s looking for.

“Oh, brilliant,” he says, grabbing a couple of packets of pads and carrying them back to his bag.

“Uh, Jack?” Eugene asks, because of course he’d had to choose that moment to return. “Why are you shoving uh… feminine hygiene products into your backpack?”

Jack hates his life. It’s gonna be like that time with Rick’s boyfriend all over again.

His mind races. “Oh, it’s something I saw on a survival show once,” he says, dragging it out as long as he can to buy himself some more time. It’s not like he thinks Eugene is a bigot, it’s just that… he might be and Jack does not want to face that on top of the massed hordes of the undead who want to eat them. “They’re super absorbent! Look, it even says so on the packet! So if you bag gets a leak, or your shoes or something…”

It is lame. It is so completely lame and it probably shows on his face like a freaking beacon.

Eugene though, Eugene just gives him a questioning look. He opens his mouth to say something and then thinks better of it and tosses him some crisps instead. “I hope you aren’t picky.”

“Oh man, cheese and onion, you are a god!” He laughs and pretty much tears into one of the packet, shoving crisps into his face and wiping the grease on his fingers off on his t-shirt.

“It’s a hard job but someone has to do it,” Eugene says dryly, settling down with his own and he tries to eat with some kind of decorum, but that goes out the window as soon as he takes the first bite.

“That may just be the best packet of crisps I have ever eaten,” Jack says when he’s done, the empty packet discarded on the floor nearby.

“You mean chips,” Eugene replies, smirking over at him.

“Oi! When in Rome…”

“I don’t actually remember anything about Rome,” Eugene says. “There was a wine tasting with less ‘tasting’ and more ‘drinking.”

“Oooooh, getting into the sordid details are we?” Jack says, leaning forwards. “Do tell. You already know mine.”

Eugene chuckles softly, his head dropping back against the wall, his eyes half closed. “It was the summer after I finished college. The guy I liked went over, I followed him convinced it would be like some amazing romantic gesture.”

Jack’s silent for a moment and not entirely sure he’s heard that right. They’ve not exactly talked about _stuff_. Apocalypse and all. “Oh yeah?” he says, voice lower and he really is very close now. How did that happen?

Eugene seems oblivious. “Yeah. It… didn’t pan out.”

“Awww, that’s a shame,” Jack says with all the sincerity that he can muster which is about zero right now.

“Not really. I did hook up with an Italian guy though. Antonio. He’s actually the one who took me wine tasting.” He gives a little sigh, sort of nostalgic which is miles better than the misery of a recent breakup at least.

“I- I didn’t know you were gay,” Jack says quietly, watching Eugene carefully.

Eugene turns to look at him, a sardonic little smile on his lips. “What, the food critic thing didn’t tip you off?”

 

There’s an underlying bitterness to the words that Jack can definitely sympathise with. Stereotypes really suck.

“I try not to judge, honestly,” Jack says with a shrug. “I mean, my first boyfriend was on the rugby team.”

“So you’re…” Eugene says, “I mean, not that I have spent much time thinking about it recently but…”

“What gave it away?” Jack said teasingly. “My amazing fashion sense and impeccable taste in music?”

Eugene laughs, and Jack laughs and then they… they stop and he’ll never figure out which of them moves first but the kiss is sweet and kind of awkward with the angle they’re at and Eugene still tastes of smoky bacon crisps.

Jack licks his lips when they part, and he’s sure that he looks thoroughly smug about it.

“Mmmm, that was a pretty big give away,” Eugene says, smiling lazily.

“Cheat.”


End file.
